My wife (the pretty little thing with the big heart) was lonely. On shopping (at least window-shopping) times, I, being a man, preferred waiting in the car while she took on the adventures the neighborhood shopping malls could offer. And now she came out running, breathless. I couldn’t really make out what she was saying but I noticed that I was being dragged inside. We ended up in a place with little dogs in cages. My wife acted like a child at Christmas. Not even being there in the flesh. The Thing I was about to meet was very hard to see. It was tiny. And kind of down, depressed, barely visible, curled up in a cage. (Just how she must have felt I could only later understand). When my wife’s voice (she whispers for talk) reached her ears, lightning struck. The lifeless Thing became a Thing of Everywhere. Sound, movement, communication. An attendant let her out: taming a bullet. And then life outside the cage area has stopped. All shoppers froze and just looked in disbelief. I was inside, but nonexistent. Time has stopped. There were only two. The pretty little thing (my wife) and the Thing I couldn’t classify. Actually I could see some blurry streaks of it. It ran in five dimensions at the same time while emitting sounds I can’t describe. All this commotion added up to an initiation ceremony of a bond for a lifetime. Some time has passed (five minutes? an hour?) when the ceremony had to stop. It did, but the Thing didn’t; it kept on running while back in the cage. And she spoke. Even I understood it. My wife speaks their language, and this was addressed to her.

The Thing was white, with one brown and a few black spots. Otherwise indescribable. They called it a Rat Terrier (or Jack Russell, matter of preference). They had some papers, pedigree and such but we didn’t really care. The price tag was steep. We had to go home for it and come back tomorrow. I don’t remember who was more heartbroken, but I’m afraid, it was The Thing, for she didn’t know… But she had a name already: Chutak. (I’ll explain it later).
Tomorrow came and so did Chutak, safely tucked onto my wife's bosoms under her winter coat. It was cold and windy so I also had a chance to hold her to my, somewhat less apt, chest. (Well, I begged for it...) I’ve never known this feeling. In the car it was already home. And from then on it was home anywhere. Because Chutak was there. We were family.

The life we have lived at this time can't be described here; you can read about it in a different blog.

This is the story of the impossible relationship of a pretty, but lost, young woman and a creature meant by God to be a dog, but later a different arrangement was made. Chutak was born a Jack Russell but became one with my wife. In body nearly, in soul totally. It was as happy as sad, as joyful as tragic.

How strangely unforgiving the arrangement is, that for many of us our pets are part of our life, but their lifespan is so cruelly short. So, many times we have to go through of the harrowing experience of departing, and, amid the tears end seemingly never ending heartache with the determined declarations of never having another pet; ever - and then we end up with the same experience again. Why? Because the indescribable joy of those short ten-twenty years are worth it, even with the knowledge of the inevitable traumatic ending. (Jokingly, I tell other pet-friends to choose some pets with a better life-span: like a turtle or a parrot… Very few has ever listened to me. And then, cried on my shoulder…)